When Pat Brady, the chairman of the Illinois Republican Party, endorsed marriage equality earlier this year, many thought it would end his influence and position in the party. But instead it seems to have highlighted a decline in the sway of social conservatives. Moderates – and those who don’t much care one way or the other – appear to no longer be giving the far right control over social issues; or at least not in this matter.

Sources within the GOP state central committee said the group of committee members seeking Brady’s ouster had been having difficulty coming up with the required 60 percent of the weighted vote to remove the state chairman. Questions also were raised over whether such action could be taken during a special meeting under the state GOP’s rules.

The states other party power players, including the House GOP leader and Sen. Mark Kirk, have sided with Brady.

While this does not suggest that Republicans as a whole are going to do an about face on marriage, it does portend that there are going to be some political fireworks ahead.

Quite honestly, in spite of all the noise from Oberweis, it was doubtful the party fringe could have ousted Brady to begin with — the right wing of the GOP just doesn’t have a lot of support here (on marriage equality, especially*), and Oberweis himself is not all that popular — he’s run for governor a couple of times and couldn’t even win the Republican primaries. Brady is much more in line with the majority of the GOP in Illinois.

(* — it’s worth noting on that score that Peter LaBarbera twice tried to file advisory referendums for anti-marriage laws. The first time, he had too many bad signatures to qualify (Mickey Mouse seems to have signed numerous times); the second, he couldn’t even get enough signatures to submit the petitions. Now, that’s probably partly LaBarbera’s incompetence, but it’s mostly just that there was no support for the referendum. And that’s years ago, before there was any momentum. I mean, this is not Kansas, after all.)

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